Headlights in my rearview mirror alerted me that someone was about to pass. Despite the hazard it posed to us, I couldn't really blame them: we were crawling along at about 40 km/h and weaving around as if we were drunk. I warned Jessica, and then, to my horror, I realized that it was a tour bus. As it drew abreast of me, it acted as a windbreak and in a split second the stabilizing force of the gale on my left vanished. I had been leaning at such a hard angle that the motorcycle abruptly turned to the left as if I was leaning through a corner. I jerked the bike upright just in time, narrowly avoiding a collision with the bus. And then, just as quickly, the bus was past me and the wind returned at full force, slamming me back across the road to the right.
"Brace yourself!" | shouted to Jessica and then I watched helplessly as she repeated the perilous maneuver I had just survived.
"This is insane!" Jessica cried. "How much further do we have to the gas station?"
I glanced down at my odometer— and realized a new problem had entered the fray. The wind was hitting us from ahead and to the left, and the extra wind resistance was killing our mileage. I watched in disbelief as my fuel gauge dropped by l/6th and then minutes later dropped again. We were only about 15 minutes into the ordeal and had ridden less than 40 km into our 110 km journey from the crossroads to the gas station, and already I was down to l/6th of a tank left. Seconds later, Jessica confirmed the problem.
"Jess, my fuel warning light just switched on."
That meant that, under normal circumstances, we had a remaining range of about 70-80 km. Under the current conditions— I didn't want to hazard a guess. Running out of gas in this wind would be a disaster since, without our forward momentum to keep the bikes upright, we would be blown over the moment we stopped.
The Great Pan American Motorcycle Expedition  Jesse & Jessica Eyer p262